[1] A round-bottomed, strongly built boat, 30 to 36 ft. long, propelled by 8 men. It was devised by the Hudson’s Bay Company for carrying freight, as a substitute for the less serviceable canoe, and was named after their York factory, the centre to which the traders brought down the furs for shipment to England and from which they took back merchandise and supplies to the interior of Rupert’s Land.
MANITOU or Manito (Algonquian Indian, “mystery,” “supernatural”), among certain American Indian tribes, a spirit or genius of good or evil. The manitou is almost always an animal, each individual having one assigned him, generally by dream-inspiration, at the greatest religious act of his life—his first fast. This animal then becomes his fetish; its skin is carried as a charm, and representations of it are tattooed and painted on the body or engraved on the weapons.
MANITOWOC (Indian, “Spirit-land”), a city and the county-seat of Manitowoc county, Wisconsin, on the W. shore of Lake Michigan, 75 m. N. of Milwaukee. Pop. (1890), 7710; (1900), 11,786, of whom 2998 were foreign-born; (1910 census), 13,027. It is served by the Chicago & North-Western, and the Wisconsin Central railways; by ferry across the lake to Frankfort, Mich., and Ludington, Mich.; by the Ann Arbor and the Père Marquette railways; and by the Goodrich line of lake steamers. The city is finely situated on high ground above the lake at the mouth of the Manitowoc river. At Manitowoc are the county insane asylum and a Polish orphan asylum. The city has a training school for county teachers, a business college, two hospitals and a Carnegie library. There are ship-yards for the construction of both steel and wooden vessels, and several grain elevators. The value of the factory products increased from $1,935,442 in 1900 to $4,427,816 in 1905, or 128.8 per cent.—a greater increase than that of any other city in the state during this period. There is a good harbour, and the city has a considerable lake commerce in grain, flour, and dairy products. Jacques Vieau established here a post for the North-west Company of fur traders in 1795. The first permanent settlement was made about 1836, and Manitowoc was chartered as a city in 1870. In Manitowoc county, 18 m. south-west of the city of Manitowoc, is St Nazianz, an unorganized village near which in 1854 a colony or community of German Roman Catholics was established under the leadership of Father Ambrose Oswald, the primary object being to enable poor people by combination and co-operation to supply themselves with the comforts of life at minimum expense and have as much time as possible left for religious thought and worship. The title of the colony’s land was vested in Father Oswald after the panic of 1857 until his death in 1874, when he devised the lands to “the colony founded by me.” The colony had no legal existence at the time, but was then incorporated as the “Roman Catholic Religious Society of St Nazianz,” and as such sued successfully for the bequest. Financially the colony was successful, but as there were some desertions and no new recruits after Father Oswald’s death, there were few members by 1909. There are no longer any traces of communism, and the colony’s property is actually held by an organization of the local Roman Catholic church.
MANIZALES, a city of Colombia and capital of the department of Cáldas (up to 1905 the northern part of Antioquia), 75 m. S. of Medellin, on the old trade route across the Cordillera between Honda, on the Magdalena, and the Cauca Valley. Pop. (1906, estimate), 20,000. The city is situated on a plateau of the western slope of the Cordillera, 6988 ft. above the sea. It is surrounded by rich mineral and agricultural districts.
MANKATO, a city and the county-seat of Blue Earth county, Minnesota, U.S.A., at the southern bend of the Minnesota river, where it is joined by the Blue Earth about 86 m. S.W. of Minneapolis. Pop. (1890), 8838; (1900), 10,599, of whom 2578 were foreign-born; (1910 census), 10,365. Mankato is served by the Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis & Omaha, the Chicago & North-Western (both “North-Western Lines”), the Chicago, Milwaukee & St Paul, and the Chicago Great-Western railways. The city has two fine parks, a Carnegie library, a Federal building, the Immanuel and St Joseph hospitals, two commercial colleges, and a state normal school (1868). The numerous lakes in the neighbourhood, particularly Lake Madison and Lake Washington, are widely known as summer resorts. Four miles west of the city is Minneopa state park (area, 60 acres), in which are Minneopa Falls (60 ft.) and a fine gorge; the park was established by the state in 1905-1906. Mankato has an extensive trade in dairy and agricultural products (especially grain), stone (a pinkish buff limestone is quarried in the vicinity), and forest products. The value of its factory products increased from $1,887,315 in 1900 to $3,422,117 in 1905, or 81.3%.
Mankato was settled about 1853, and was first chartered as a city in 1868. On or near the site of the city stood a village of the Mankato (“blue earth”) band of the Mdewakanton Sioux, who derived their name from one of their chiefs, “Old Mankato.” In this region occurred the Sioux uprising of 1862, and from this point operations were carried on which eventually resulted in the subjugation of the Indians and the hanging, at Mankato, in December 1862, of 38 leaders of the revolt. In the uprising the Mankato band was led by another chief named Mankato, who took part in the attack on Ft Ridgeley, Minn., in August, in the engagement on the 3rd of September at Birch Coolie, Minn., and in that on the 23rd of September at Wood Lake, where he was killed.